The great city Busara, long a center of culture and learning, gleams like a precious jewel on the western shore of Donao, that vast salt lake of unfathomable depths. Centuries ago, Busara was little more than a fortified library built by the warrior-monks of Zazic*, the goddess of knowledge. Today, that library has grown to become a vertiable city within a city. Thousands of Zazic’s faithful investigate every field of human knowledge, and scholars from across the world make pilgrimages to Busara for a chance to study and learn.

Of course, mere mortal reason cannot sufficiently grasp all that there is to know. If Knowledge is a tower, then mortal efforts are a ladder that cannot reach the top. In her mercy, Zazic does not leave her faithful trapped by the limits of their own intellects. The scientist-prophet Isaija Paskal received a series of architectural visions from Zazic. He also received a compulsion to transform these visions into reality. Thus, Elimungazi was built.

Workers excavated an enormous pit in Busara’s eastern park adjacent to the ancient library, and builders contructed a series of walkways and stairs running from the porticos above to the cobblestone floor below. When confronted with ineffable questions, Zazic’s faithful may receive permission from the hierarchy to meditate, ascending and descending the stairs according to Zazic’s prompts. Only the most spiritually attentive seekers can “hear” all of Zazic’s instructions during this meditative stair-walk. Success unlocks great secrets, and even failure may still yield partial knowledge.

*Zazic collects and collates everything that can be known. She reveals the patterns within disciplines and the relationships between fields of knowledge.